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The haute cuisine of women chefs

Let's face it: there is still a mild form of injury in Italy against women chefs. The women cooks, to leave the role of "good performers", must demonstrate something more than men, so to overcome the old and limiting prejudice that women give their best in the kitchen with desserts. Recently, the Italian gastronomic landscape offers many examples of great women cooks: young, prepared, passionate and aggressive. ItaliaSquisita asked the gourmet journalist Luigi Cremona to indicate us the most talented women chefs of our country. And the surprises are not missing!
The youngest, perhaps (… we do not ask the age for respect) of these promises is Valentina Galli, form the restaurant "Oinos" from Siracusa (www.oinosrestaurant.it). From Milan, she is the author of the eclectic cuisine of this small, charming restaurant in one of the streets of the island of Ortigia. Valentina represents the union between North and South, the tradition and the interpretive imagination in a creative menu, based on ingredients typically and exquisitely Sicilian in which colors and contrasts meet. Among the restaurants in Syracuse "Oinos" is certainly a required step in gourmet.
Across the Stretto di Messina, we find love and attention to territory and tradition in Pizzo Calabro (VV), with the chef Caterina Malerba of the “Toscano”, the restaurant right on the plaza outside the castle (Via B. Musolino 14/16, 89812 - Pizzo (VV) Tel. 0963534162). The name is not coming from the type of cooking, but the surname of the husband of Caterina, the owner Tonino Toscano. Caterina believes strongly in the revitalization of its region and aims to demonstrate that Calabria is no less than other regions of the Peninsula: in her kitchen offers a personal interpretation of the food culture of Calabria. High quality raw materials combined with preparation techniques dominated with sincere professionalism, combine to offer excellent taste experience to the palate. Menu all fish (raw seafood, freshly caught seafood and fillet; fresh tagliatelle with black truffle and seafood carbonara, fish soup, etc. ...) without forgetting the 'Nduja and all the Calabria specialties! Among the restaurants in Calabria is a very interesting place to "taste".
Attachment to traditions and local ingredients and the desire to know them, even in a colleague from Puglia: Lucia Schiavone, who with her husband Nazario Biscotti (cook too, but mainly in the restaurant) leads the intimate restaurant “Antiche Sere” from Lesina (FG), on the lake side of Lesina (www.tuttogargano.com/antichesere). The location is as simple as the ingredients of the cuisine of Puglia: mullet, eel, salicornia (sea herbs), typical ingredients of Lesina proposed moving between tradition and review with the specific desire to took them from the home cooking and to present them in an original way: mullet marinated in citrus sauce and ricotta, spaghetti with eel sauce, grilled eel with Salicornia, delicious homemade desserts. But the menu changes very rapidly, following the inspiration of Lucia and Nazario. And to think that their adventure began a few years ago when they decided to reinvent themselves by dedicating to their passion: the preservation and enhancement of their traditional territory. Among the restaurants in Foggia “Antiche Sere” in Lesina is a must-try.
Same call to enhancement of regional dishes - this time from Abruzzi - from “Zenobi-Ristoro di campagna” in Colonnella (TE), in the Teramo (www.ristorantezenobi.it). In a country house nestled in the hills, among vineyards and olive trees, this small restaurant is also a farm that produces the raw materials cooked. The cook Patrizia Corradetti offers a rich and genuine gastronomy from Teramo, enhancing it. The cuisine is traditional, from the land, specialty simple, authentic of Abruzzo and high quality raw materials, mostly produced on the farm property: meats and cheeses, fried cheese, olives, grilled vegetables, salad ...; timbale scrippelle from Teramo white or red; guitar with pallotte; soups ...; grilled lamb... Among the restaurants in Teramo, the restaurant "Zenobi" deserves a special attention.
We are always in the center of Italy with the solar Barbara Cannarsa of the restaurant “La Filanda” in Manciano (GR), which together with her husband, Gian Paolo has restored the ancient walls that once had housed a granary and then a production of yarn, a warm environment (stone arches, iron beams, travertine, sandstone and wood) in which Barbara offers a typical Tuscan dishes cooked according to the Tuscan style, with a focus on seasonal foods, the culinary avant-garde and the limited use of fats.Barbara interprets in an original way the tradition of Maremma (www.filanda.lucavignali.it). Protagonists are of course the local products of organic production. Pappardelle, pici and pasta specialties, homemade tomato soup, certified Chianina, field vegetables are the basis of a menu that reflects the authenticity and imagination of those who process it. Among the restaurants of Grosseto and the province “La Filanda” in Manciano enhance flavors and fragrances in a truly interesting way.
Moving several kilometers to the north, there is the revelation of the year, Antonia Klugman who stunned everyone with her personal and "cosmopolitan" style, coming, as she says, from the versatility of her family origins. In Pavia from Udine, manage “L’Antico Foledor” (UD), and behind that shy smile hides the determination of who knows what wants: to open her restaurant and express her in the kitchen she left her studies in law years ago. Self-taught, offers a very personal cuisine characterized by unusual combinations, alternating textures, local ingredients contaminated with Eastern traditions (www.villalovaria.it). From season to season the menu changes, the only constant the feeling of being faced with a brand new kitchen, refined, and why not ... feminine.
We conclude in style with Viviana Varese and her restaurant "Alice" in Milan (www.aliceristorante.it), run by women (together with Viviana the partner Sandra Ciciriello). We are in Milan, but the cuisine is all seafood, with pleasing aromas and incursions in the Mediterranean colors and in the Neapolitan confectionery: all shows the Neapolitan origin of the cook.Creative and sensitive to aesthetics and the olfactory component of the dishes, the cuisine of Viviana is a pleasure to taste before the eyes: a world of alchemy, combining Mediterranean tradition and experimentation, a universe of flavors and fragrances, colors and inventions. Among the seafood restaurants in Milan, the restaurant Alice stands out and impresses!
Comments are open! Who do you think should be added to this list? What other stars shine in the firmament of Italian women chefs?